Monday, February 5, 2018

12 Practical Examples Of wget Command In Linux

Wget is a useful GNU command line utility used to download files from
internet. This utility can download the files from servers using popular
protocols like HTTP, HTTPS, and FTP. It runs in the background
(non-interactive) and hence can be used in scripts and cron jobs. GNU
Wget was written by Hrvoje Nikšić and currently, it is under Tim Rühsen,
Darshit Shah, and Giuseppe Scrivano.

In this article let us look at 12 useful examples of using wget utility.

​Downloading a file from web

$ wget

This command will download the specified file in the URL to the current
directory. The below screenshot captures downloading of Apache HTTP
server source code (compressed file) from the URL:
http://www-eu.apache.org/dist/httpd/httpd-2.2.32.tar.gz.
​
wget output contains the following details:
​

The name of the file being downloaded

A progress bar showing percentage downloaded

The size of the file that has been downloaded

Current download speed

The estimated time to complete the download

Downloading a file with specified filename​

To specify a different filename the -O option (uppercase O) is used.

$ wget -O

​Silent download

To make a silent download, “–q” option is used as follows -

$ wget –q

​Resuming partially downloaded file

In order to resume the partially downloaded file, the “–c” option is used as follows -

$ wget –c

​Downloading files in background

With “–b” option, wget start the downloading in background and start writing -​

$ wget –b

​Multiple downloads

For this “-i” option followed by a file containing multiple URLs (one
URL per line) can be used. wget will go through each URL and download
them all. How simple is that? :-).​

$ wget –i

​Enable debug information

​With “–d” option, more detailed information can be obtained which may be useful when troubleshooting a problem.

​Downloading a file from untrusted URL

It is possible to bypass the verification of the SSL/TLS certificate by using the option: "--no-check-certificate". ​

$ wget --no-check-certificate

​Downloading file from password protected sites

For both FTP and HTTP connections, below command options can be used to pass on the user credentials:

$ wget --user= --password=

However, these parameters can be
overridden using the “--ftp-user” and “--ftp-password” options for FTP
connections and the “--http-user” and “--HTTP-password” options for HTTP
connections.

For FTP connections:

$ wget -–ftp-user= --ftp-password=

For HTTP connections:

$ wget -–http-user= --http-password=

As specifying password on command
prompt is not recommended, use of “--ask-password” option is recommended
which will prompt for the password, keeping it out of history log.

$ wget -–ftp-user= --ask-password
$ wget –-http_user= --ask-password

​Redirecting wget log to a file

Using “-o” option (lower case “o”), one can redirect the wget command logs to a log file.

$ wget –o

​Downloading a full website

One of the good features of wget command is mirroring. With this
feature, entire website can be downloaded. Using “ -m” option it is
possible to download an entire website from the web.

$ wget –m

​Specifying download speed limits

Using “—limit-rate” option, the download limit can be restricted.
The download limit can be expressed in bytes, kilobytes (with the k
suffix), or megabytes (with the m suffix).

Conclusion

​wget has advanced features available which make it a
very powerful command. It performs well over slow or unstable network
connections. In case a download is incomplete due to a network problem,
wget will automatically try to continue the download from where it left
off. It can download files larger than 2GB on a 32-bit system. GWget is
a GUI utility for wget. So give it a try if you're not a fan of CLI.